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Mario Kart 3DS Development Details - Japanese Iwata's Ask
- Thread starter Shikamaru Ninja
- Start date
tassletine
Member
For everyone wondering why Nintendo have so few people on staff, there's a reason: You make better games this way. Hiring more people spreads work thin, it eases peoples lives but doesn't improve creativity.
When any employee is given a large amount of work to look after, not only will they feel better about their job but they will work harder. This is especially true of creative people who want to make as much of a mark as possible on the work and absolutely hate working in factory like conditions.
On top of this, hiring more people makes communication between departments harder and that will also significantly decrease creativity. It's no surprise that the biggest games (GTA etc) are the least creative, despite the high level of quality.
If you look at Nintendo games you will see that the art, music, controls and hardware all work in tandem beautifully. This is down to the team behind the products actually being a TEAM rather than a boss with sub bosses who obey orders. Naughty Dog and Valve work in the same way.
When any employee is given a large amount of work to look after, not only will they feel better about their job but they will work harder. This is especially true of creative people who want to make as much of a mark as possible on the work and absolutely hate working in factory like conditions.
On top of this, hiring more people makes communication between departments harder and that will also significantly decrease creativity. It's no surprise that the biggest games (GTA etc) are the least creative, despite the high level of quality.
If you look at Nintendo games you will see that the art, music, controls and hardware all work in tandem beautifully. This is down to the team behind the products actually being a TEAM rather than a boss with sub bosses who obey orders. Naughty Dog and Valve work in the same way.
That's the biggest thing for me. Should be back to greatness now. Glad to hear of the return of Co-op championship too. Will make unlocking stuff fun again. If the clan stuff is as good as it sounds, this should be one of the best MK's yet
I think this game would be perfect for paid for dlc. As long as it's priced inline with the stuff already in the game. No Call of Duty style rip-offs please.
DXB-KNIGHT
Member
Haven't most of NST left long time ago to join Microsoft? I think Shikamaru Ninja mentioned it once but I'm not sure.Poor NST though
Possibly mate, looks like UK based sites are publishing them as of now.
In a world where this exists, anything is possible.
A KART GAME BASED ON A LICENCE? I'M SHOCKED! O_______________O (BOLDED TO SHOW HOW SHOCKED I AM!)
AbsoluteZero
Banned
It's just such an odd fit.
Error Macro
Member
YESSSSSSS
Well that's a shame. Who is going to do Wave Race and 1080 for the Wii U as I have been dreaming of?
Watch Da Birdie
I buy cakes for myself on my birthday it's not weird lots of people do it I bet
How does that even work?
Aren't, like, all those characters on the box art the same dude, just in different forms? What is going on here!
Baby Mario and Mario blah blah blah...
Shikamaru Ninja
任天å ã® å¿è
Never said most. But one big loss was losing Colin Reed (EAD/NST programmer) to Turn 10 which of course is an exclusive Microsoft developer on the Forza series.
Nintendo is guilty of being harsh and reluctant to explore many new intellectual properties. Internally and externally with their first-party talent. But they have been known to reward their employees well with bonuses and sponsored vacations. The company has never fired or released staff or closed out any studios. You work for Nintendo you have a steady job. If you want to create the next original IP, obviously you take your chances elsewhere.
Let's just hope we get a Wave Race. F-Zero. 1080. Excitebike in the future. Doesn't matter where it comes from at this point. But if I were a guessing man, my money is on NST developing one of the Wii Sports / Wii Play / Wii Fit / Wii Music entries for next-gen.
Nuclear Muffin
Banned
To be fair, there hasn't really been a lack of new IPs this generation from Nintendo (if anything, there's been more this generation than in the last 2 combined!) People just choose to ignore them.
It's only a select few studios who haven't been given the chance to work on something original (Retro, NST etc) Hell, in just this year alone Nintendo have released 9 new IPs! (going by Japanese release dates here), with 2 more already slated for next year and the promise of more to come. That's pretty good by any publisher's standards!
UGH! Hurry up with the translation Nintendo! I want to read it in English!
Shikamaru Ninja
任天å ã® å¿è
Well NST did work on Aura-Aura Climber and that New York Times Crossword Puzzle game. But outside of the small niche Japanese low budget games they pick up, the only exception to the rule was Monolith Soft. Truthfully Nintendo gambled on them (and Last Story) to create a Final Fantasy / Dragon Quest type of franchise. The revenue did not pay off. Will things change now?
Monolith was like 80 people strong when Nintendo acquired them. Sure there maintenance is quite expensive. That is probably why Nintendo assigns them jobs to model objects and work on cutscenes for Smash Bros and Zelda. Post-production labor but they are trying to make use of that staff and the money they shell out for it.
Nuclear Muffin
Banned
Nah. Nintendo probably weren't expecting Final Fantasy/Dragon Quest numbers (that's just insane, no new RPG IP this gen has come even remotely close!) from those games.
They're primarily an RPG developer and Nintendo will probably have them continuing to work on new RPGs (and they've already started on a Wii U game) Even if their games don't pull in Final Fantasy numbers, they help to cultivate a userbase for said Final Fantasy games. They're capable of making 2 games at a time, so when the 2nd team isn't making a game, they'll probably get them working on production work for other games (ALA SSBB and Skyward Sword), but it doesn't mean that they're gonna stop them from making games (and we already know they're making another one!)
That being said, I'd love to see them tackle another Disaster DOC style action game. It was mental! (in all the right ways
As for their focus on new IPs, they've already publicly stated that they're coming and they'll probably be their main focus next year for the 3DS.
Lord knows what NST are up to. I still haven't got a clue (could be co-developing anything really, even Wii Sports U!)
The return to form I've been waiting for after Wii. Tracks look amazing, the worst items were trimmed, and the formula revitalized with air and water racing. With the community features it's set to be the next best Mario Kart, surpassing MKDS.
I especially love how they retrofitted the retro tracks with gliding and water sections: rather than being a retread its almost like having an extra 16 new tracks.
Nuclear Muffin
Banned
You could say the same for all of the retro tracks in Mario Kart Wii as well. They retrofitted jump pads and places to pull off tricks, plus the new physics in each game makes for a very different experience when they have retro tracks. But yeah, Retro's work seems much more extensive!
I still miss the Lightning Cloud though. That item was awesome!
Shikamaru Ninja
任天å ã® å¿è
The first entry of any RPG is not going to sell 450303 million. But I think it was about Nintendo having a high install base and seeing if they could at least create a following for a franchise. Not sure what the minimum number of sales would have sufficed their barometer. But eitherway I think they all gloriously failed. But so did like every other game for a traditional core userbase not named Mario Galaxy or Zelda (?).
Well going from Wii to Wii U, means the development costs are going to rise. Which means how is reluctant conservative Nintendo going to play this round of stratego with a potential Disaster Day of Crisis or XenoBlade. 3DS would probably be a better fit for any original ideas.
Are you only referring to their internal and wholly-owned teams? Let's take Genius Sonority as an example, which was nearly dead after its Wii project was killed. They were only saved by a cheap cash-in from Disney.
Someone here said that they were working on 3DS technology, including tech for dev kits and online infrastructure.
Nuclear Muffin
Banned
Perhaps so, but we know that Monolith have already started working on the Wii U so that point is moot. As for development costs, that depends entirely on the budget given to the team. Going from Wii to Wii U doesn't necessarily mean that every game has to have a $20 million + budget. I think you'll agree that Wii Sports U and Wii Fit U's budgets will not be substantially higher (if at all!) than Wii Sports Resort.
They'll just keep their overall budget in check, rather than take away their creative freedom. I've already said before that I believe that most Nintendo developed games wont look substantially different graphically speaking from their current gen efforts, save for a select few franchises like Pikmin, Zelda, Wave Race, F-zero and 1080, where they deem the extra graphical focus to be important.
I mean, this is the publisher/developer who is happy to release a basic looking 2D game at retail that probably cost no more than $1-2 to develop (Rhythm Heaven Fever), alongside the biggest budget game they've ever made (Zelda Skyward Sword). They've repetedly mentioned how they want to cultivate a market that accepts all budget ranges of game development. This would simply be part of that movement.
Shiggy said:
BTW, if this is correct, that means that I was right again Shikamaru!
Nintendo doesn't help their new IPs by releasing them the way they do, NCL's approach to marketing nearly all of them continues to baffles me. Why do they wait until the week a game comes out to really release relevant information about it? I guess they didn't have to give a shit if they all just bombed with Brain Training and Wii ____ selling alongside Mario this past generation though.
Shikamaru Ninja
任天å ã® å¿è
How is the point moot if the question is what will Nintendo green-light Monolith Soft to work on. Are they just working on Smash Bros post-production again? Fire Emblem Wii U co-development? The question is will they be developing Disaster Day Crisis level original titles for an HD environment. As far as ranging the budget, Rhythm Tengoku Wii will be cheap, but your typical Monolith game will not be cheap, unless they are developing Wii U Quiz or something like that.
You say this all the time!! I don't even know what you are right about. WarioWorld/NOA Engineering and NTD and NST all work in the same building.BTW, if this is correct, that means that I was right again Shikamaru!
Nuclear Muffin
Banned
Well we do have that teaser shot from their company page...
Of course it's possible that it might get cancelled, but it does suggest that they're not working on Wii U Quiz...
(that's NST's job!)
As far as budget goes, they could make a HD RPG on the same kind of budget as Xenoblade. It might not look like Final Fantasy 13 (hell it might even use mostly pre-rendered backgrounds. That image is more than a little reminiscent of Baten Kaitos after all!) but it could still be done.
In this case, I'm saying that I was right about NST being put to work primarily on middleware for Wii U and 3DS (remember what I was saying before to you a whiles back?). Assuming that Shiggy's source is right of course!
I only remember seeing that on NeoGAF or Anthony's website, so there's quite a possibility that you are the source.
Nuclear Muffin
Banned
Oh lol! That was just idle speculation!
GAF>Internet>GAF again.
Ahh well, I still totally called Retro's involvement being a full collaboration, so I still win
Jaded Alyx
Member
Aren't you meant to be arguing against me?
Nuclear Muffin
Banned
Oh come on, pretty much every character was pure cheese in that game!
Boo, Toad, Waluigi, Wario, Hammer Bros, Diddy, Peach. They're all fucking cheaters in Strikers Charged
There was something about NST doing online network stuff for 3DS, I'll try to find it. At least that part is no rumour.
Edit: No luck, I guess.
Nuclear Muffin
Banned
I don't remember anything about that, but if you find it, I'd love to see it!
Edit: Oh wait hang on, wasn't it something related to an offline online game patent? Or was it pokemon related? (Something like that, I remember vaguely)
Edit 2: A "Massively Single-Playing Online Game." That's the one! Can't seem to find the patent itself though. Was it filled by NST?
Edit 3: GOT IT! http://www.google.com/patents/about?id=LVXrAQAAEBAJ&dq="Massively+Single-Playing+Online+Game."
I think it was an NST developed patent actually! (Yeah, must be. It's the same guy who came up with the Wii Motorbike patent) That must've been where my speculation came from!
Now I remember seeing something related to technology development, clearly stating something about networks, on a LinkedIn profile. Either I just cannot find it anymore or it's been removed since then. Wasn't anything newsworthy except that they worked on 3DS technology.
Outside of that tease image on their site have they ever shown anything about it?
Nuclear Muffin
Banned
To be honest it makes perfect sense anyway. They clearly didn't dedicate their whole staff to Mario VS DK 4 and they've not exactly been making much noise since then.
With both the 3DS and the Wii U in need of behind the scenes SDK/middleware work, it stands to reason that this is the likely explanation for their absence from game development.
Not as far as I remember.
TheFLYINGManga_Ka
Member
Had no idea Retro helped with the development. Pretty cool!
Watch Da Birdie
I buy cakes for myself on my birthday it's not weird lots of people do it I bet
The main thing I've learned from this topic is how much I want Retro to develop a Waluigi game for the Wii U.
They'll turn Waluigi Pinball into a reality
Shikamaru Ninja
任天å ã® å¿è
Ahh well, I still totally called Retro's involvement being a full collaboration, so I still win
Well when the credits are out we will see what the exact workforce was. With programming and music probably being in-house, still isn't a 50/50 deal. But everything is still up in the air.
But Nintendo has an SDK team at WarioWorld/NOA Engineering. I am guessing they are more experienced than grabbing software programmers with experience in other fields. NST worked on a myriad of small projects besides MvDK, but also they had a few Wii patents that never materialized into anything.
No, but after 2009 their employee number went down from 80-90 to 20. And they suddenly worked on the garbage hit Tinkerbell DS.
Phife Dawg
Member
Luckily for us only few people knew how to exploit the greatness that is Waluigi properly. And it wasn't so bad because at least you got to see crotch chops!
Waluigi time!
Nuclear Muffin
Banned
They then bulked up a bit for Pokemon Typing and then lost a ton of staff after it got released.
Very true. Walluigi is just broken!
You want the ball?
Hi I'm Daisy!
Captain Chaos
Member
Is there an English translation?
TheGreatMightyPoo
Banned
"The Battle Mode continues to be marginalised, but at least it's not exclusively a team-based affair anymore - now it's a competition to see who can score the most hits in an allotted time limit. Hardly the Mario Kart 64 glory days, but we can see ourselves playing it a lot more than the semi-disastrous offerings on DS and Wii".
Good enough for me.
Good enough for me.
Hot Coldman
Banned
The Main Event
Member
Only disappointing thing so far (from reading the reviews) is the coin-collecting doesn't seem to affect the race, rather they are only used to unlock new items. Kinda missed opportunity there. Would've been great if it affected your kart speed just like in the original SMK. It added depth back then.
Graphics Horse
Member
..Hmm. I think there must be more to it than that, even if it doesn't affect your speed.
In the demos I've seen videos of you can collect a maximum 10 coins, which are counted at the top of the subscreen.
Edit: new videos show losing coins on damage:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weROpKrEGj0&feature=related
Edit:
I'm pretty sure it will increase speed, but subtle enough for the lol games journalists to not notice.
I think it'll work just like the original. (with a bonus post race shop system)
Shikamaru Ninja
任天å ã® å¿è
Maybe they were re-allocated to Project Sora, or Nintendo, or even dispered amongst all the developers in the Nintendo owned Tokyo Pokemon Building. Have you ever cared about any authentic Genius Sonority project?
OH GOD WHAT TIME IS IT
JAPAN TIME!
I want both to be playable in the next Smash Bros. game.
Phife Dawg
Member
Where's Ysiadmihi anyway? Iirc he was pretty actively playing MKWii.